Alfred Obrist P.E. Certificate Found

Monday, May 13, 2019

A construction manager at a local firm in Syracuse made a small purchase at a Salvation Army that turned out to be quite a historic find for our firm. He purchased a document intending only to keep the frame. Thankfully, he decided to look up who the recipient on the certificate was. The document is the original Professional Engineer license for Alfred Obrist, issued in 1954. Upon discovering that Al Obrist was a founding partner of our firm, he thoughtfully offered the information to one of our architectural clients, who passed it onto us. We are so grateful that he took the time to look deeper into his purchase and allowed us to reclaim this important piece of our firm’s history.

Al Obrist began practicing on his own in 1968. In 1972, Bruce Appel joined him, and in 1975, the firm Obrist & Appel was formed when Bruce, a licensed Landscape Architect, was named a Partner. As the firm grew and evolved, the Partnership would become Appel Goff & Associates, and ultimately Appel Osborne in 1998.

Al Obrist is such an important and respected pillar of our firm’s history and the foundation on which our culture and values were built. While the art of landscape architecture can be a creative process, Al’s licensure as a Professional Engineer instilled the importance of unwavering technical dependability in our designs. Offering a seamless blend of both the art of landscape architecture and the technical soundness of site engineering is a hallmark of our firm. We are proud of what we offer our clients today, and it is due in large part to the road paved for us beginning with Alfred Obrist.